


Remember My Last

by Trismegistus (Lebateleur)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Dubious Consent, Dubious Ethics, Dubious Morality, Emotional Manipulation, First Time, Manipulation, Rare Pairings, Seduction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-08-13
Updated: 2004-08-13
Packaged: 2021-02-27 07:55:28
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22233649
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lebateleur/pseuds/Trismegistus
Summary: Written for the Albus Dumbledore ficathon at the LJ SweetsAddiction community.
Kudos: 2





	Remember My Last

There is a book of fairy tales on the floor next to where she keeps his basket. It must have slid from atop the chest of drawers, where she's put all the toys that aren't new enough, or expensive enough, for her Sweetie-Duddums. At the very least she knows that _she_ didn't buy the book. She disapproves of reading in general, and fairy tales in particular. All those stories about cruel, ugly, older sisters offend her. It's as if they've stacked the deck against her so that her younger sister was destined to get the good looks, the handsome princes, the adulation, the parental love, just by the happy accident of being born second. Her parents even gave _her_ a pretty name. Lily, the beautiful, noble flower of Easter and countless royal conservatories, while she must content herself with Petunia, a common garden flower often uprooted as a weed.

Lily's been upstaging Petunia since the day she was born. Petunia well remembers the visits to her family from the frightening people with the funny hats and strange clothes - she didn't know they were...that sort...at the time - how they'd pulled her away from her toys and put strange bits of wood into her hands, how they'd asked her all sorts of nonsensical questions, and how displeased they'd been with her reactions to it all. And she hadn't even known what they wanted!

"Albus," the woman had said, "are you certain that _this_ is the family--"

"Yes, Minerva," he'd answered. "The portends clearly indicate that he will be born to the wizard," he paused, "or witch, who will be born into this family, and Centaurs are seldom known to be wrong."

"I'm not denying the fact that she has a magical aura," the woman had said, and stared at Petunia with a most disapproving expression on her face. Petunia could feel the tears pricking at her eyes, sliding scalding hot down her face. Why were they so angry with her? She didn't understand the game with the sticks, but then they hadn't explained it! And her parents looked so disappointed.

Too disappointed to notice how sad she was.

"But..." the woman said. 

"Yes, she does appear to have been born a Squib," the man answered. "But isn't that proof that there is magic in this family? It's too early to give up hope."

Petunia's father had laid a loving hand across his wife's swollen belly.

And then, five months later her sister had been born, and her parents had cuddled her and praised her, watched _her_ and not Petunia, never Petunia, with baited breath until that damned letter came, and they were so thrilled to have a witch in the family. 

After that there had been even less time for Petunia. Her parents had coddled Lily and cooed her disgusting 'talents' while only Petunia devoted serious attention to her education. Lily conjured flowers, which could just as easily be grown in the ground, out of thin air. Petunia was the one who knew how to decorate a living room, iron a straight crease down her husband's trousers, remove a grease stain from the bedroom carpet, cook a good roast -- 

The roast.

The book of fairytales fell from her hands as she rushed downstairs to the kitchen, desperate to reach the oven before dinner burnt to a crisp, she could smell the meat charring before she was even halfway down the staircase, what _had_ she been doing dithering about upstairs while there was still supper to fin-? 

Oh, that's right, getting the stuffed blinky giraffe for her little Didsy-duddums. 

She paused, hand on the banister, torn between bringing her darling son his favourite toy or going to salvage an already-ruined roast. She took one, then two steps back up the staircase, of course her son was more important than dinner, Vernon would be angry, at first, he didn't like it when dinner wasn't properly done, but she couldn't abandon her little boy without his blinky to keep him company, could she? 

But all was silent in Dudley's room; her sweetums was asleep again, darling thing. 

She turned and headed resolutely for the kitchen and the damage awaiting her there.

It was worse than she had thought; a billowing cloud of thick black smoke greeted her as she opened the oven, making her cough and her eyes water. The roast was ruined. 

"Stupid, stupid woman!" she spat as she went to open the windows and vent out the kitchen, then thought the better of it - what would the neighbours think if they saw? - and fanned the smoke about until it dissipated into a thin grey haze throughout the ground floor.

She felt very suddenly close to tears. Rally, Petunia, she admonished herself a moment later. What kind of household do you keep? Dinner's ruined and you've no one to blame but yourself.

So rally she did, much better, she was certain, than Lily would have. Lily had had _magic_ at her disposal. Lily had never had to do an honest day's housework in her life. 

Lily hadn't even bothered living long enough to learn what being a mother really meant. No, she'd foisted that duty off on Petunia as well.

Vernon would be angry about dinner, but perhaps she could make it up to him, tonight. At the very least, she should ring him at the office and ask him to bring some take-away home. 

But Vernon wasn't there when she rang. Vernon's secretary (Delia? Denise? Daisy?) said, ever so sweetly, that he was out with an important client and would Mrs Dursley like to leave a message for him?

Petunia knew she should say something quickly, because she was certain the secretary, smarmy, smug little chit that she was, was laughing at her already. But her mind wouldn't work through her disbelief. 'Out with an important client' - Petunia knew exactly what _that_ meant. 

He wasn't, he couldn't, he _wouldn't_. Not again. Not so soon. Not after she'd just given birth to their baby. He wouldn't, he--

"Mrs Dursley?" chirped the secretary.

Petunia slammed the receiver into the cradle without a word, and then felt a fool for it once the deed was done.

She stormed back into the kitchen, trapped by a house that was suddenly too small. The pictures - the two of them at their wedding, on honeymoon in Wales, Vernon holding a week-old Dudley - seemed to mock her from their frames on the wall. 

She and Vernon had looked so _happy_ on their wedding day. What had gone wrong? She was a good wife. She was a good mother. She even took care of Lily's brat.

Lily. Lily, who had found a way to burden her even in death. As if caring for one newborn wasn't enough. And the brat would want his formula soon. She stormed into the kitchen, where the smell of burnt roast assaulted her once again, threw a pan of water on the stove and set the bottle in it to heat. She'd have to buy some more tomorrow; they were almost out. Formula wasn't cheap, but she'd be damned if she was going to play wet nurse to Lily's offspring. 

A thin, tremulous whimper pierced the air. Potter. She had waited too long to get his formula started and now she'd have to listen to his wailing until it was ready. It was like nails scraped down a chalkboard, nothing like the fine, robust crying of her baby. She shut her eyes and tried a few deep, gulping breaths, but it did no good.

"Be _quiet,_ " she whispered fiercely, but to no avail. Potter only wailed louder. And now her Diddums was crying too. 

She slammed the refrigerator door shut - that was several pounds worth of wasted electricity as she'd stood there with it open, staring at nothing - and stormed up the stairs to the first floor, Potter shrieking louder and louder with each passing second. And now he'd disturbed her darling, too.

She hadn't a moment to spare; her baby needed her, but she stopped at Potter's room all the same, and stood glowering down at him where he lay, still in the basket they had brought him in. Neither she nor Vernon thought he deserved a proper cradle.

"Look what you've done, you ungrateful brat."

Potter screwed up his ugly red face and wailed harder, as if she had said something unfair. "Shut _up,_ " she hissed at him, and felt only vaguely uneasy for being so sharp to a baby.

She slammed the door on Potter and crossed the hall to her darling.

"Oh, my little Diddy-darling," she murmured, lifting him from his crib. "Don't cry now. Mummy's here."

He'd soiled another nappy, and she tried not to notice the stink as she carried it to the toilet, and the waiting tub of solution. She'd wanted to use disposable nappies, but Vernon wouldn't hear of it - think of all the money we'll save with cloth, he'd said.

That had been the end of the discussion. And now here he was, she thought, out trouncing around with some, some, some _tart_ while she was here at home, cleaning up shit.

Just let him say anything about dinner, she seethed, collapsing into the rocker and putting Dudley to her breast. Just let him say anything.

But then Dudley began to pull, and she was transfixed - there was no other word for it - by how perfect her little baby boy was. 

"You certainly are a strapping lad," she murmured, tracing the contour of a soft, plump cheek. "Such a big, fine boy. Mummy's little Duddums."

He was the light of her life. Her perfect baby boy, all hers. 

Potter's wails were barely audible through the thick wood of the door, and Petunia slowly relaxed, here with the heavy, solid weight of her son in her arms. 

She winced a few times - her boy certainly was a lusty nurser - but he was finished soon enough, and she lay him lovingly back down in his crib, then left the room, shutting the door softly behind her. 

The house was calm and silent for one brief, blessed moment, and then Lily's brat began shrieking fit to wake the dead. She flung the door to his room open and strode to his basket, angry and desperate to make him _stop crying._

"What do you want?" she hissed, lifting him from the basket by the armpits. His face was scrunched tight and mottled purple with the effort of his wailing. 

She resisted the urge to shake him. "Be _quiet!_ " 

It didn't make sense. His room was warm, his nappy dry, he'd just been fed...

No, he hadn't. The formula was still downstairs, on the sto--

She dropped Potter unceremoniously into his basket and raced to the kitchen for the second time that hour. She found the bottle of formula bobbing up and down in a pan of cheerfully boiling water. 

She didn't have another bottle prepared and there was no way she could feed this one to Potter, much as she might want to. A sudden image of herself forcing the scalding liquid into Potter's angry little mouth left her first exhilarated and then ashamed.

_And Potter wouldn't stop crying._

She'd stormed back upstairs and into the spare bedroom before she knew what she was doing.

"Be quiet you ungrateful _brat!_ " she whispered. "Shut up, shut up, shut up, _shut up_."

She seized his basket and shook it roughly until Potter's wails escalated into eardrum-shattering shrieks.

And then Dudley was awake and howling and Petunia was overcome by a sudden, crushing guilt - she'd made her baby cry. 

So after a lifetime of living in Lily's shadow, this is where she found herself, trapped alone in a house that stank of charred meat with two crying babies, and her husband off with who knew which young girl. Oh, she despised Harry Potter.

This is not how her life was supposed to be.

"This is all your fault!" she accused, and made up her mind as soon as the words escaped from her lips.

It had only been one month, and they'd been careful never to let the neighbours catch sight of the brat. Of course, they'd spent a fortune on nappies and formula, but she was willing to let that slide. And maybe, just maybe, Vernon wouldn't be so cold to her once she had more time for him, with Potter out of the picture.

It was easy to ignore Potter's howling now that her mind was made up. Vernon had the car, of course, but it was a small matter to find a cab company in the phonebook. Her fingers dialed the number without the slightest hesitation. 

The operator agreed to dispatch a cab within twenty minutes, possibly sooner.

Each second was like an eternity, but luckily she had plenty to occupy her as she bundled her Duddums into his all-in-one and fetched his blinky giraffe to keep him company. 

She spent the last five minutes in the living room, her eye to a discretely-lifted curtain corner, dandling her boy on her hip, with Potter in his basket at her feet, one of Dudley's dummies stuffed into his mouth to keep him silent. She felt slightly remorseful for sacrificing one of her darling's toys in such a manner, but she would buy him two, no, three new ones once Potter was out of her house for good.

She was out the door and at the corner of the drive as soon as she saw the cab turning the corner into the lane - it wouldn't do to let the neighbours see her embarking from the driveway with _two_ children in tow.

And then they were off, Petunia silently urging the driver faster, faster, although she said nothing aloud. Best not to do anything that would make this hire seem in any way remarkable.

She had him drop her off at a street corner a few minutes' brisk walking from her destination, and made sure he saw her marching toward the front door of the nearest house as he pulled away. 

She reversed her direction once he was safely out of sight, and hurried toward her true destination, the St Errata's Home for Unwanted Children. She waited five, ten minutes in the shadows of the building across the street, making sure that absolutely no one was about, her heart hammering with an anticipation that was almost euphoric. 

And then, when she could stand it no longer, she darted across the street and placed the brat's basket at the door to the institution. 

It was finished. It was finished! She'd never have to deal with the Potter's wailing and neediness ever again! It was the most wonderful feeling in the world. She turned to leave, her darling-diddums cradled in her arms, a wide smile almost splitting her face in two, and--

\--Stifled a shriek as a huge, masculine shadow loomed out of the darkness behind her. 

"What do you think you're doing, Petunia Dursley?" boomed the figure.

And then he stepped forward so that the light fell across his face, and she knew him for who he was, though it had been decades since she had seen him last.

"You," she whispered, cowering in towards her darling son.

His eyes burned, hidden though they were in the shadows beneath his pointed hat. "I beg you to reconsider this course of action," he said, and though she could not see the shape of his mouth through his thick white beard, she knew it was thin and angry.

"I will _not_ ," she hissed, "have that brat in my house for one more minute."

His eyes blazed. "Have you so little decency," he continued, "that you would abandon the only child of your only sister to the hands of strangers?"

"My only sister?" she asked. "Abandon him the way she abandoned him to me? Oh yes, I would indeed."

He seemed now to tower over her, sucking to him what faint illumination the streetlights gave.

"I knew you could be a low woman," he said, as if to himself, "but I did not realise you could be this low. This boy is your family."

"My family?" she gasped, amazed at how little he understood. "My family? What family? My family only ever cared about _her_."

It was the wizard's turn for disbelief. "Lily loved you, Petunia," he said softly, almost sadly.

"Oh, did she?" Petunia said, her voice rising with every syllable. "That's why she used her...her _spells_ so that my parents only ever had time for her? That's why, on my wedding day, the only day they ever paid attention to me, she told some...story...about being off chasing some magical criminal so that they spent my wedding worrying about her and not me--"

"Voldemort was far more horrible than a 'criminal,'" said the wizard, but she had no ears for his excuses.

"And that's why, as soon as she knew I'd give them their first grandchild, she went off and got herself pregnant too, because she couldn't _bear_ that I steal her glory, even for one minute--" She had to stop here and fight for breath, and calm her darling boy, who'd awoken and was crying once again.

The wizard shook his head. "How anyone could think these things of _Lily_ ," he said.

She wanted to tell him to shut up, but his kind felt no compunction about using their magic whenever it suited their purposes, and she couldn't risk putting her Duddums in danger of any spell. 

"Petunia, your sister did love you, no matter what you have chosen to believe." He paused, shook his head again. "Even if you could never bring yourself to love her back, I implore you, for the sake of her child, your nephew, do not abandon this boy here."

The fear receded slightly at the look on his face. 

"You can't..." she said carefully, haltingly, and then when no bolts of magic came from his wand to strike her down, more forcefully, "You can't force me to keep him, can you?"

The wizard sighed heavily. "I cannot," he said at last, "as much as it pains me to admit it."

A sudden surge of adrenaline coursed through her veins like a thunderbolt. She had power, _she_ had _power_ over this man. She, a plain, common woman, discarded by her husband, had power over this man. She could make him listen to her, however much he hated it.

"Please, Petunia," the wizard said, his voice now gentle and conciliatory, "You've no idea how vital it is that young Harry Potter be raised safely in your home."

Her eyes narrowed shrewdly. "Vital?" she said. "How vital?"

"The fate of the world depends upon it," said the wizard, without a moment's hesitation.

It was obviously a lie. The fate of the _world_ , resting on Lily's whelp? But if that's what the wizard thought, she might as well make of it what she could.

"I'll take him back," she said. "But you have to give me something in exchange."

Yes, it did mean that she wouldn't be rid of Potter, but what she was about to gain in exchange would more than make up for that. And think of it: a way to trump this wizard and her worthless husband in a single go.

"Are you attempting to barter with me?" asked the wizard. 

"Yes," she said simply. She didn't understand why he seemed to find the idea so shocking.

He looked at her with an expression of extreme distaste, and then said, "What do you want?"

She told him.

A week later she paced the hallways in her best housedress, restlessly straightening picture frames and doilies, waiting. Dudley and Potter had both been fed and put to bed - she'd even taken extra care with the brat so that he wouldn't wake and spoil things with his whining.

It was evening, but Vernon was nowhere to be seen. He was off on another 'business trip' with another 'important client,' but that hardly bothered her. She was going to meet an 'important client' of her own tonight.

She could barely contain her nervous excitement as the doorbell rang. She'd doubted, that night, after she came home, whether the wizard really could grant her wish. It had been easy enough to believe at the time, when he loomed over her horrible and imposing, and the look of utter disgust on his face after she had made her request (and really, it hadn't been unreasonable at all, she thought, at least not given the circumstances), had more than convinced her that what she had asked for was in his power to give. 

But that sort of thing was harder to believe in broad daylight, during long, solitary days of baby shit and formula, and clothes covered in sick. 

And now the doorbell was ringing, and her hands shook slightly as she opened it. 

He was perfect. He was exactly what she had wanted, dreamed of all those years as a young girl when she had still believed that this, and not Vernon, was who she deserved. His hair was wild and dark, and his eyes glowed. 

She adored him.

He took her by the hand, this lover that she had had the wizard conjure to her, and all the words she'd meant to say spilled from her mind as she let him lead her silently to the bedroom.

As she lay by his side, after, she thought to herself, it will be worth it. Even keeping Lily's brat in the house will be worth it, now that I have the man I've always deserved. All the past disappointments of her life seemed such small things now, now that she had been granted what she deserved to have.

Let Vernon bluster and rage when he found out - there was nothing he could do; magic had brought this man to her, and what could Vernon possibly do to take him away? Petunia smiled. She would forgive him of course, but first she would see to it that he was very sorry he had ever left her so lonely. 

She rolled onto her side and slipped into a contented slumber.

The house was silent when she woke, and the bed beside her empty. She rose and took her time washing, dressing, doing her hair, reveling in the aftereffects of her first full night's sleep in a month.

She was also stalling, though she was loathe to admit it. What was she to say to her new lover? Should she fix his breakfast? 

She realised with a sudden shock that she didn't even know his name.

Rally, Petunia, she told herself, and headed to the kitchen.

"Petunia." 

She turned slowly to face, not her lover, but the wizard.

"What are you doing here?" she whispered. She still had Lily's brat, true to her word. He had no reason to be here. "I'm finished with you."

"Yes," he said gravely, "you are. And I with you. But before I leave this house there is one matter which we must discuss."

"No there isn't," she said. "I'm through making deals with you." She wanted this wizard out of her house, before he scared away her--

"Where is he?" she whispered, a sinking sensation spreading through the pit of her stomach. "What have you done with him?"

"I have done nothing with him, Petunia," the wizard said. "He never existed."

"Then who?" she whispered, but she already knew.

His eyes never left her face. If he felt any shame for having used her so heartlessly, he gave no sign of it. 

Petunia's gorge rose into her throat. She had, had, with this, this...

"You foul, loathsome, _evil_ \--"

There was a sudden clap of light, and the kitchen smelt of ozone. "Do not tempt me, Petunia Dursley," he boomed, and every bone in her body turned to jelly, while her mind raged at her to flee. 

The wizard reined in his anger as quickly as he'd loosed it. "Believe me when I say I took no joy in it," he said, in more even tones. "But I had to ensure the child's safety, whatever the cost."

"Why?" she spat, the horror of what had been done to her growing larger with every passing second. He had, he had...

"Because this child carries a heavier burden than you could possibly imagine, Petunia. It will fall to him to defeat the wizard who has murdered his parents, or die in the attempt. Two prophesies have foretold this, _and it is vital that he live to fulfill his destiny."_

Petunia thought back through the years, to the first time she had laid eyes on this man. "He will be born to the wizard or witch that will be born into this family." 

And now here he was.

The wizard continued, "His mother died to protect him. But the effects of her sacrifice cannot survive outside the bonds of family. And so the boy must remain here."

"I would have kept him here," she said thickly through her growing horror. "For what you promised me, I would have kept him. But not now. Oh, no, not now. We made an agreement, and you haven't kept it."

"We made an agreement I could not possibly keep, Petunia," he said, and there was a note of sadness in his voice, as if he were explaining death or pain to a small child. "Not even magic can create a soul's companion." 

"So you went and used me for fun, is that it?"

He looked worn and tired, as if he had any right to be. "Perhaps you are correct to claim that I used you. But it was a necessary step to reaching our new agreement." 

"We have no agreement now," she hissed.

"We have had a new agreement since last night," he said.

Last night, when he had asked "Will you give me what I want?" before he crested, and she had said yes. _Yes._

He was searching her face carefully, so he saw when she understood. 

"Yes," he said. "It is an old magic, and one that is not wholly of the Light. But make no mistake, Petunia Dursley, we are bound by its terms. See that the boy is raised, here, in this house, to his majority, and you shall have nothing to fear from me."

"And if I don't?" she whispered.

"I would not wish to be you," he said. "I will not have last night's work end in nothing."

He turned and walked through the door, although she was to find that when she played the scene in her mind later, she could not remember him having paused to open it. Upstairs, a baby began to cry.


End file.
